


the job is done, and fate has won

by dames_for_jamesbarnes



Series: the only constants are the stars [2]
Category: Criminal Minds (US TV)
Genre: CIA Agent Reader, Conflict Resolution, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Light Angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-17
Updated: 2020-07-17
Packaged: 2021-03-05 04:34:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,043
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25338457
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dames_for_jamesbarnes/pseuds/dames_for_jamesbarnes
Summary: Your stomach clenched.“Let us help.”(Was the softness in his voice imagined?Ithadto be.)
Relationships: Aaron Hotchner/Reader
Series: the only constants are the stars [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1835089
Comments: 18
Kudos: 88





	the job is done, and fate has won

Sometimes, on particularly boring days, you found yourself staring outside your window.

There wasn’t much that happened in terms of natural scenery. The CIA Headquarters in Langley wasn’t known for its views… it barely had trees. But it was amazing what you could catch. Standing there, in your pantsuit and bare feet, watching as agents known for gathering intel across the world stumbled into illicit affairs, and gambling debts, all in that parking lot.

Because for some reason, CIA agents were still human.

Beyond the parking lot, you watched the sky. Watched it fade from bright blue or cloudy gray to a deep, stunning black, so endless it made your head spin.

(You watched the stars, sometimes.

It wasn’t the same.)

This wasn’t one of those boring days, unfortunately. It was the kind of day that made your head hurt, and your feet ache rushing from one secretary to the next. Your promotion taught you a lot, mainly that bureaucracy never went away, and neither did the missions. But your feet and your mind needed a minute, sixty seconds, to catch your breath. One minute before returning to the phone calls. The emails. The hunt.

So you watched the parking lot. Watched the blue expanse, dotted with white clouds. And when you turned back to your desk, your mind was gloriously blank, ready for another wave of information, of orders _from_ you instead of to you. Your promotion came with your own office, your own choice of boring wall color, your own window to look out from, but that couldn’t make up for the fact that you were here and your feet were on thin carpet.

You slid back into your desk chair.

“Fuckin’ hell,” you murmured to yourself, and with a pinch to the bridge of your nose you got back to work, typing away on a work computer that you wanted to smash with a hammer on your last day. “Where are you, Askari?”

Another hour passed, and your fingertips flew, your brain working to analyze whatever it could snag. You worked hard.

(Fate worked harder.)

A knock. Firm, loud, meant to get your attention, made with broad knuckles against the wooden door.

“Come in,” you called, but your focus had already shifted from digital to analog, a stack of files beginning to be sorted through. You didn’t even realize it was him, speaking without being spoken to.

“The Undersecretary has reason to believe that Askari would be stateside –“ you started, but when you looked up it wasn’t another CIA agent, and your mouth slammed shut, an audible click that made your teeth ache.

Not CIA. Not in that suit.

“Agent Hotchner,” you greeted, for a moment too stunned to think much more past greeting. Your feet, under your desk, slid into your shoes, your arches protesting the movement.

“Agent Y/L/N. Good to see you again.”

Something was haunting him, that was for sure. It would seem that every time you met, he’d have a burden on his back. No beard, though.

Some part of your brain mourned the loss.

And then, it clicked. You were an analyst in the CIA for a reason. The agents taken – FBI. An FBI agent, mere hours after the news broke, coming to visit you, one of the leads for the task force?

You couldn’t help your chuckle of disbelief, shaking your head. The irony. “She’s one of yours.” Another file was pulled away from the stack, dismissed with a glance.

“Yes,” he replied. You didn’t need to look to feel the way he ached. Did it hurt him, as much as it hurt you? Talking again? “I… wasn’t aware you were a lead on this case.”

See, you had shoved it all down, those years ago. Had forced yourself to push forward, move on, ignore the way he’d settled into your heart. You wished you had found apathy in that, but that wasn’t how an analyst’s brain worked. You couldn’t look at a woman, built from 22 to think and think and think, and tell her to stop.

It didn’t work that way.

Your eyes didn’t lift from your desk, another filed shoved aside from the stack.

“You thought you had the right to be aware.” You smirked, your tone curt. “A bold assumption, Agent Hotchner.”

You saw him tense out of the corner of your eye. If it brought you a bit of glee, you didn’t betray it. Just let yourself enjoy it while it lasted. When the agent didn’t respond immediately, however, you finally looked up again, schooling your features into something polite, a brow raised to mimic what you used to see across a table in a tent.

“I think you were very much aware that it was me here, Agent. Neither of us are stupid. So you need something, Agent Hotchner? Or is this simply a social call? Because I have work to get back to.”

That seemed to reboot him. His jaw twitched for a moment, and you kept your gaze steady, waiting for him to make the next strike. He moved forward into the room and you watched as he closed the door behind him.

“I need what you know on Integrity, specifically Tivon Askari.”

That shocked a laugh out of you, and you shook your head, going back to the file on your desk. “Nice try. Next question.”

“This isn’t a request. I need that intel.”

When you looked up again, his jaw was clenched completely, and those deep dark eyes were narrowed, hidden in shadow from the sunlight in the window.

“Excuse me?” Your pen was set aside, polite smile gone. “You do not have clearance to get that intel.”

“One of my team has been captured,” he shot back. “I’m doing what I need to so she can come back home to her husband and son.”

Your smile turned placating, almost sickeningly sweet. “The CIA is aware of what has happened and is doing what it can to find Agent Jareau and Chief Cruz. You’re kidding yourself if you think otherwise.”

“I need to guarantee she comes back safe. She’s not an asset to be used and tossed aside.” His voice was stronger now. He never went easy on you, in Pakistan, and he wasn’t going easy on you now.

You never backed down, of course. Not then, not now. “She’s not an asset, she’s a hostage.” You were trying your best to reason with him. “And right now, we’re focusing on finding her and Askari. Now, please. Let us do our job.”

“I can’t trust that the CIA doesn’t have ulterior motives in this, Y/L/N.”

You were doing your best not to get worked up, trying your hardest not to let his words hurt. Not to let that resentment overwhelm you. But his eyes seemed to be doing their best to tear you apart. It was his family, you reminded yourself, closing your own eyes to breathe before opening them again.

“Then trust me,” you settled on. The high road. A softer voice, a softer look with the blank face. “The FBI and the CIA need to work together. But we succeed, even when we work alone. We’re doing everything we can to make sure Agent Jareau gets back safe and sound. You do not and will not have the clearance. Let the State Department handle it. Let the CIA handle it.”

His approach had to change, he surely realized. Maybe that was why he took a moment, to think, about his next move. When he spoke, it felt like a different person, like a different Aaron Hotchner. “Let the BAU help, at the very least.”

Suddenly his demeanor changed. Something about him dropped, a wall or two among the thousands falling down so you could see past it. Into his eyes, as he leaned close.

He wasn’t… seducing you. He was appealing to you. To your history. He needed this. Needed you to work with him, needed you to save Agent Jareau. With wide brown eyes with bags under them, a brow that was permanent furrowed until at least three beers in.

“We _need_ to find her. There’s – there’s a time limit, and what he does to his victims… that cannot happen.”

When you swallowed, it was tight. He was too close.

His eyes were like quicksand. Hidden, unassuming, until you sunk into it. You couldn’t escape his slow gaze, his quiet scan.

One hand was flat against the folding table.

(No. It was your desk. It wasn’t a table, covered in photos, his magnifying glass next to the most recent attacks. It was your desk, and this was Hotch, two years later, thinking that he could, what, seduce you into giving him more –)

Your stomach clenched.

“Let us help.”

(Was the softness in his voice imagined?

It _had_ to be.)

With a sudden move, you stood to your feet, almost stumbling at the feeling of your heels. You pushed away from the desk, away from him, moving toward the window, staring out at the brilliant blue sky. Little clouds floating.

You needed air. After all, he had taken all the oxygen, and you were the match he was trying to light. But you couldn’t be there, you couldn’t let yourself be there again. You’d opened yourself up, for the first time in so long and all that had been left was an empty tent.

“Let the BAU help.” Your voice was ragged, and you couldn’t school it into something cruel. One or two walls of his fell. Your whole defense system seemed to crumble. “Like you helped in Pakistan?”

There was a pause. Heavy. Dense. “Agent… I left to help my team –“

You whirled to face him, body tight, face dangerously close to breaking neutral. “And now I’m the one in charge of saving your asses. You left me an unfinished case, and we’re not doing that here. I am not compromising my position for amateurs. Your team will step back and let the professionals handle this.”

The silence was dead air, precious seconds in the hunt for Agents Jareau and Cruz wasted in favor of meeting each other’s gaze. He seemed to realize his misstep, and what was definitely imagined was the guilt you thought you saw flicker, a grimace on his features. When his emotions settled, however, he was back to neutral. Still never a smile.

“… we’re not going to stop looking for her.” His voice cut through the memories. The pain.

“I know. Neither will we.”

(His eyes were on you. Scanning you, up and down, over curves and lines that made you.

His eyes were on you. Watching you as you watched the stars, smiling when you smiled.

They were his family.)

The greater good, you told yourself, not the way Hotch’s heart seemed to break when you turned away again. A lead shattered.

They were his family. He wouldn’t stop. None of them would. Not until they killed themselves trying.

You couldn’t give him much. Not much of anything at all. But a start.

Your mind worked. As it always did, thinking and thinking and thinking. You settled on an answer as you moved to settle back in your chair. Settled on a shrug, looking back down at your papers. Settled on hiding your pain, on going numb, on truly forgetting Aaron Hotchner.

“If you really want to go above me, fine. Undersecretary Jackson at the State Department will be glad to field your visit. But I’m telling you, she’s not someone who spills a whole lot of state secrets for an FBI agent, not even one who knows about _Hastings_.”

If he noticed the way your voice was empty? He didn’t mention it, just nodded. You could almost hear the wheels turning.

“I believe I understand. Thank you, Agent Y/L/N.”

Your eyes drifted to the window. Blinds open. A brilliant blue sky. A much better sight than his eyes, whiskey brown in the shine of sun from the outside world. No more shadows.

When the sun set, would there be stars tonight?

This wasn’t Pakistan, you reminded yourself. That was clear. After all, Aaron Hotchner didn’t have a beard. There wasn’t a smile to be seen. And this time, you didn’t get three months to say goodbye. When you spoke again, you did not hold back.

“If you ever need something from the CIA,” you whispered, not daring your voice to rise anymore without breaking. “I’ll give you another contact. Pakistan was a long time ago, and things change. They… they have to change.”

_I have to change_ , you told yourself.

Like a breakup. You wanted to cry until you could laugh at your own stupidity.

“Agent Y/L/N...”

“Good luck, Agent. And I mean that. But don’t make me regret this anymore than I already have. You have your lead.”

(When you’d closed the tent flap, your eyes had stared straight ahead, your fists clenched so tight your nails broke the skin on your palm. You took a couple of breaths, lifted your chin, and pushed forward. Moved on.)

When the door closed, you gave yourself sixty seconds.

-

They found her, in the end. The BAU, breaking every protocol, destroying every bit of trust ever established with the CIA, found the agents missing with mere minutes left to spare, piggybacking off of your intel. You got the FBI’s own report on your desk three hours after it ended, the rescue of Jareau and Cruz officially closing Integrity on their end.

Just another day for them, you supposed.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t over on your end until much later. Weeks after the rescue, the last of the reports finally made it to you so you could sign off. Agents who’d investigated the deaths of Askari and Hastings getting around to giving you the autopsy reports, testimony from the BAU, and final closure on what Askari was after. Your signature was quick and brutal, a swipe of pen so the file could be set aside. A close to that nightmare, and onto the next.

Integrity was over.

(Fate wasn’t.)

Your hands moved to push against your temples, rubbing in a vaguely circular motion to push down the horrors in those photographs. The reports were then reorganized, moved to your box to be delivered the next day. With a long sigh, you leaned back in your chair, your toes once again bare and curled into the carpet.

It was late. Your day was “officially” done.

And yet, your job never ended. The phone started ringing, a horrific melody, and you let it ring two or three times before picking it up.

“Y/L/N,” you answered, too exhausted to bother hiding how tired you really were.

A couple of beats passed as you listened. Slowly, your eyes got wider and wider, before you couldn’t take anymore.

“What? Here?”

Your desk phone’s cord was stretched to the window so you could peek out, no blinds to cover you as your gaze scanned under the streetlights.

There, a nondescript SUV. Khakis, work boots, a polo. And there, grasping two bottles of shitty beer in his hand…

“Fuckin’ hell.”

Your eyes blinked, a couple of times. Maybe it was a hallucination, after all, but there were no fuzzy edges. He was really out there, and you were captivated. Watched him sit, glance at his watch. Stared as he reclined, leaned back to look straight up at the sky.

Stargazing.

And then to you. You knew, even from this distance, that when he turned his head it was to find your office window.

It’d been weeks.

(It’d been years.)

You’d hadn’t stopped thinking about him. Even after telling him that you were no longer his point of entry into the CIA, even after being very clear something had to change, your mind hadn’t ever been able to let him go. Maybe there was a reason, or maybe you just hated yourself, but the sight of Aaron Hotchner wasn’t entirely unwelcome. Maybe now it could be finished, another case closed. 

You took a breath. If it was going to happen, it would have to include talking it out. Like adults. You could do it, you thought. Of course that was easy when he was still three floor down.

“Okay,” you told the overnight security. “Just. Send him up. He knows where my office is. Yes, I’m aware. Let him through.”

When you hung up the phone, you knew you only had a few moments to compose yourself. Your hands moved to your hair, still somehow hanging loose around your shoulders, and rummaged around for a hair tie. You pulled it up, high and tight, and for a moment your flashbacks were colliding with real life.

A meeting with Agent Hotchner.

He arrived without any pomp and circumstance. Didn’t even knock, considering that your door was open and you were leaning on the front of your desk. Your suit jacket was draped over your chair, but it felt like opposite day when he walked in. You tried not to linger on it, but he seemed to be thinking the same thing, those infuriating eyes saying more with a slow up and down then words ever could.

A game of push and pull commenced. Who would break the silence first?

Of course, it was you. You were never one who kept your words to yourself. Not even after your promotion, when words were the sharpest things you had on your person half the time.

“Interesting move, coming at the end of the workday for a nightcap,” you told him, and the twitch of his lips was not lost on you.

“I suppose, it’s a roundabout way of saying congratulations,” he admitted. One beer was offered to you, and you took it easily, falling back into a routine you hadn’t tried to replicate in two years.

Another quick move, this time to pop the bottle cap off on the edge of your desk. It marred the surface, but you didn’t flinch. “I didn’t realize I needed to be congratulated. The BAU saved Agent Jareau, after all.” It might’ve been a little bitter, but the taste was washed away with crappy stout.

He nodded. “She’s… back home. Healing.”

The unmentioned trauma didn’t need to be explained. You were both agents. You both knew.

“Good. I’m glad,” you told him. With feeling. “Hope you’re giving her PTO.”

“She’s taking her week, but. We’re all addicted to the job.”

Silence. A couple of sips of beer on your end. Hotch’s was still unopened, gripped tightly in his hand. He was fighting with himself, it seemed, judging by the way his normal unflappable attitude was replaced by a shift in stance, a glance around your office.

“Agent Hotchner –“

“Agent –“

Stumbling over each other, you shook your head, waving to him. “Please. I’m sick of hearing my own voice.”

When he nodded, it was abrupt, and like always, his words were organized in his head before he spoke, and sometimes you just wished that he would say what was really on his mind, without fear of being misunderstood or misquoted.

“Y/L/N,” he started. “I’m… I’m here to right some wrongs. And I’m here to congratulate you.”

“Hotchner, I told you –“

“Please. Just. Let me say what I need to say.”

Your mouth closed. Your feet, sweltering in your heels, pushed out of them so your bare toes could press into the carpet. He moved to stand next to you, to lean on your desk right beside you, his bare arm brushing against your strict button-up.

“When I was in Pakistan,” he told you, “I wasn’t looking for an escape. I was on a job. And when I got there, I didn’t think that it would be a solace, but it was. You... made it that. I was comfortable. We were working, but. It was time away that I needed, to remember what was important.”

(“You’re important.”)

You weren’t looking at him, you couldn’t, but his voice then and now made your free hand curl against your desk, gripping the wood like your life depended on it.

“My team means everything to me. You know that,” he continued, “but you meant something to me, too. I opened up to you, and. The first outside my team since my wife died. Then I threw it all away.”

“You left for your family,” you said simply, having to say something. With a shrug, you looked at him, lower lip caught between your teeth. “I didn’t begrudge you, Hotch. I was… pissed, and hurt, but I understood _why_.”

He shook his own head. For a moment, you saw what you had seen in that tent. A gaunt face, a pained expression. A man with so much hurt that he didn’t know where to put it. “I looked up the case, saw you’d finished it. But I didn’t call, because… well. You were moving on. Moving forward.”

His hand was flat on the desk.

“I’m sorry,” he finally said. His voice was low, and thick. “For not calling. For not finishing the case, for… everything. And congratulations, on getting promoted. There’s no other agent I know who’s more deserving than you.”

When you placed your hand on his, you felt warm. Felt your stomach roll at the look he gave you, eyes not wandering from your face, from the way you gave him the smallest smile.

“It’s okay, Hotch. It’s… It’s done.”

For the first time in two years, you felt like you could breathe. That pain you’d set aside was slowly fading, his words a salve for a broken heart. It was _easy_ , you realized. Easy to shift from cautious glances to catching up, as if this was how it was meant to be all along.

“I honestly believed that I would never see you again,” you admitted. “But I’m glad I did. Maybe you can tell me what keeps you from tearing your hair out doing shit like paperwork.”

“Hard time adjusting?” The worry lines in his face seemed to fade, that furrow vanishing so he could raise a brow. “Two years not enough time?”

You didn’t expect to laugh, but you did. Chuckled a little, shaking your head as you glanced around the farce that was your office. “Hotch, I – I don’t know how to explain to you how much I hate wearing suits.”

“I can’t believe they took their best asset out of the field.” When you realized he was grinning, you laughed again. “Did they expect you to say thank you?”

“Thank them for the pay raise, I guess, but I’d prefer jet lag and a month at a time in the States over whatever it is I’m doing now.” You shook your head, remembering the looks on your bosses’ faces when you told them just how you felt about being moved to desk work.

You leaned in, finally, to confide in him, “Honestly, I think they thought that if they put me back here, I would stop running up a tab in bars across the world.”

“A routine like that is expensive,” Hotch agreed. He seemed to be looking past you, at something only he could see. “Though it was something that kept me sane.”

“It keeps all of us on track. A couple of beers, some lawn chairs, and the stars.” You smirked again, turning to look at him, at his unopened beer. “You want me to pop that open for you?”

He didn’t answer right away. After all, he was like you. You can’t train someone to think and then tell them to stop. He was thinking, and thinking, and thinking about something.

“Hotch? You want your beer?”

But it was that moment, two years in the making.

That’s when he decided to kiss you.

Sitting there, on a desk in a dark office. Nothing but lamplight and the stars outside your window illuminating the high points on your face. Nothing but your hand on top of his, a calloused thumb running over his skin. No fear of discovery, when the door could be closed, and locked, and agents with egos looking for a way to climb to the top.

Pakistan was over.

(And for the moment, so was fate.)

**Author's Note:**

> follow me @qvid-pro-qvo on tumblr.com for more reader-inserts!


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